At the beginning of the fifteenth century the king and nobility of Bohemia were in competition to fulfil what each saw as the interests of the kingdom. By 1405 the nobility had halted the efforts towards centralisation being pursued by Wenceslas IV, and largely controlled the country’s government. Soon afterwards Jan Hus and others began to call for reform of the Church and religious life. Followers of Hus also worked to include all social groups within the political community, which was to be broadened to include institutions giving the commons of both town and country their place. Imbued with a particular understanding of the Christian faith and of the laws of God, all levels of Bohemian society would be identified by a common faith and by a common, Czech language. Tradition, however, was to prove too strong for them. By 1434, the nobility had defeated the radicals, and by the end of the century it once again dominated the country. Calls for popular sovereignty had been silenced.